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GS Engineering and Construction To Send All New Staff Overseas

kpride, April 24, 2015, 8:14 a.m.

GS Engineering and Construction has made an unprecedented decision to send all its new recruits this year to overseas building sites. The industry is watching whether this experiment could create more jobs for young people in a depressed job market.

The decision was made by GS president Lim Byeong-yong, who feels that the only way forward amid a saturated domestic market is to look out to the wider world. GS on Wednesday said all 58 new recruits the company hired early this year went to overseas after about two months of training here.

They have been sent to eight countries and they stay there for at least three years. Thirty-five went to the Persian Gulf, a major market for GS -- Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Ten went to Southeast Asia and 13 to Egypt and Turkey. Six new female staff went to Kuwait, Thailand, Turkey, and Vietnam.

Their salary will be about double what they would get had they stayed in Korea thanks to incentives. They can enjoy 15 days holiday after working for 105 days. The new recruits welcome the decision. A GS executive said, "The new recruits are fluent in foreign languages and they are highly motivated. It's too early to evaluate at this stage but the overall responses have so far been positive."

The company had to replace 20 percent of the new recruits who were originally selected but were unwilling to work abroad. Park Byeong-chang, the head of human resources, said, "The new employees will face a lot of challenges and hardships in a foreign environment but they will gain a lot of experience that will become an invaluable asset to the company."